2. Focus on cutting defense spendingIf he's looking for common ground with Republicans, Obama will "tackle the bloated defense budget," says Ben Armbruster at ThinkProgress. And there's plenty of room for cuts. Worldwide, America accounts for 43 percent of all military spending. Second-place China accounts for just 7.3 percent of the global total.

3. Outflank the GOP from the rightThe obvious thing for Obama to do is "to come at [Rep. Paul] Ryan and the GOP mainly from the left, demagoguing their plan to 'cut' Medicare to pay for tax cuts for the top" earners, says Matt Miller in The Washington Post. But a "shrewder, debate-transforming move would be to outflank the GOP on the right" by proposing to balance the budget in this generation, not decades into the future, as Ryan proposes. Obama can zero the deficit by 2018 if he ditches the Bush tax cuts and slashes spending.

4. Embrace his deficit commission's reportInstead of "[blazing] a fresh path," The Washington Post says, Obama will promote the plan proposed by Erskine Bowles and Alan Simpson, chairmen of his bipartisan deficit-reduction panel. Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) added credence to this prediction, calling "the basic approach of Bowles-Simpson... an important starting point." Terrible idea, says Paul Krugman in The New York Times. This conservative-leaning proposal raises the retirement age and is short on details for controlling Medicare costs. By "more or less" endorsing it, Obama would "define the center as being somewhere between the right and the far right."

6. Endorse the Senate "Gang of Six"Obama won't directly embrace Bowles-Simpson, but he'll reportedly "get behind the Senate's bipartisan Gang of Six," which has been working on its own plan for months, says Dan Amira in New York. "Backing the Gang of Six will give Obama plenty of bipartisan cover, something he always would prefer but which is especially vital on the prickly issues of entitlement and tax reform." One problem: They don't have a plan yet. The other: "The last thing that the gang wants, at this stage, is a presidential endorsement," say Politico's Budoff Brown and Thrush.